The New Yorker Against Romney

If you aren’t aware of the cruel but, thankfully undying, meme — “Dogs Against Romney” — then you can get an eyeful of an update by looking at the March 5, 2012 cover for the New Yorker Magazine:

Here’s the horrible background on what Mitt Romney did to the family dog, Seamus, on a trip to Canada:

It seems that during a 12-hour car ride from Massachusetts to Canada back in 1983, there wasn’t enough room in the family station wagon for the five Romney sons as well as Seamus, the Irish setter. So Romney put the dog in a crate on the roof instead. “He’d built a windshield for the carrier, to make the ride more comfortable for the dog,” according to the story.

But what has really outraged dog lovers is what happened next, according to the story, when the first sign of trouble was spotted by oldest son Tagg. “‘Dad!’ he yelled. ‘Gross!’ A brown liquid was dripping down the back window, payback from an Irish setter who’d been riding on the roof in the wind for hours,” the now infamous story reads.

At that point, Romney pulled into a gas station, borrowed a hose, washed down both the dog and the car, returned the dog to the roof, and the family continued on its way.

There are more than 78 million Americans who own one or more dogs — about two out of every five households. A Google search of “Romney Dog on Car Roof” brought me 1,080,000 results.

I don’t know how many of these 78 million dog owners (and thus, dog lovers) have yet heard or read about Romney doing this horrible thing, much less making his disingenuous claim that Seamus loved the experience on top of a speeding car for 12 hours, while his bowels turned to water.

Romney’s sons told a reporter Seamus ran away once the family arrived in Canada:

Mitt Romney may not have told the whole truth about the scandalous tale of his Irish Setter, Seamus, being strapped to the roof of his car during a 12-hour family road trip to Canada. According to a trusted Politicker tipster, two of Mr. Romney’s sons had an off-record conversation with reporters where they revealed the dog ran away when they reached their destination on that infamous journey in 1983.

Mr. Romney’s wife, Ann, has previously said Seamus survived the trip and went on to live to a “ripe old age.” As of this writing, Mr. Romney’s campaign has not responded to multiple requests for comment on this story.

Mitt Romney is unfit to be President of the United States. If you do not have the basic, common, human decency to treat your dog as something to be cherished and loved and respected in all aspects as a living and cogent being — then you cannot make decisions about people and our human welfare. You are unable to decide the cost of sacrificing soldier lives in a war. You are incapable of extracting kindness from your foes when you have nothing of the reserve living in your ghostly soul.

Since Seamus’ story broke in 2007, the dog has been rightly hounding Mitt Romney across the world — and I predict that Seamus will be the dog that didn’t have to bark or bite to have his ultimate revenge against his persecutor.